How to Scare a Skeptic 101
by Helix Spencer
Summary: Damon Salvatore is a tried and true skeptic. Elena and Alaric take matters into their own hands. Introducing a brand new trope: sasquatches. Delena, if you squint. Relatively spoiler-free. Rated T for mild swearing. Enjoy!


**A/N: Happy (belated) Halloween! I think it still counts if I post it at night...please, enjoy!**

 **XOXO, Helix.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own the Vampire Diaries or Party City.**

* * *

" _Look, if I see something I've never seen before, I'll throw a dollar at it." -Damon Salvatore_

 _Season One, Episode Thirteen._

* * *

"Just because you don't believe in something doesn't mean it's not real!"

"Of course it does-I should know, I'm Mystic Falls' leading authority figure in everything supernatural. For example, what does-and does _not-_ exist."

"To be fair, Elena," Alaric commented, "you didn't believe in any of that stuff before you met Stefan and Damon, did you?"

"Of course not," Elena agreed. "But it isn't any less plausible that Bigfoot can exist here just like vampires and werewolves can."

"It's obviously a publicity stunt." Damon countered.

"Well, I believe them." Elena went to refill her coffee mug with hot chocolate and returned, sitting back down on the couch. She tucked her feet under her. "Don't you think you're being a little pessimistic? As a vampire?"

"No," Damon scoffed.

"It's not completely impossible, Damon," Stefan joined in.

"Yes, it is. I don't know how you all believe this...garbage."

"Just like I believe that vampires are real," Elena replied easily, reaching for the remote to turn up the volume.

Damon winced. "Vampire ears, here, Elena," he bit out.

"Human ears, Damon," She pointed to her own, unaffected by his sharpness. "Not everybody has supernatural hearing like you do."

"I dunno, they seem pretty spooked to me," Alaric shrugged, ignoring them both and unwrapping a chocolate eyeball. He popped it in his mouth and chewed thoughtfully. "Like they saw a ghost or something."

"Or...a vampire!" Stefan smirked happily, and leaned around his chair to pull a flashlight out of a side-table drawer. He switched it on, stuck it underneath his chin to elongate his features, and grinned.

Damon rolled his eyes at him. "It's not real."

"There's hundreds of years of first-hand accounts from explorers from all over the world claiming otherwise," Alaric pointed out.

"OK, Mister History Teacher, where'd you get that line from? Your anthropologist buddy, Isobel?" He pouted sarcastically.

"Low blow," Alaric smirked bitterly, toasting him with his own glass of something dark, anyway. "It's just my personal opinion that the hikers are telling the truth."

"Hikers. _Exactly._ " Damon exclaimed incredulously. "They probably ate some mushroom and hallucinated the whole thing."

"I'd like to think that hikers count as explorers," Stefan started.

"Of course," Alaric nodded.

"So wouldn't the hikers' story count as a legitimate witness testimony?" Stefan asked curiously, tossing the flashlight back and forth in his hands.

"Well-"

Damon cut him off. " _No,_ it doesn't, _Ric._ " He plunked his own empty glass down on the coffee table, eyeing him. "I need some hard evidence before you're gonna convince _me_ of anything."

"Hard evidence like that?" Elena pointed casually at the screen. It boasted a grainy picture of massive footprint in the dirt filled in with some kind of sticky white goo.

"Fascinating," Stefan mumbled.

"There you go, Damon. Proof!" Elena crowed.

He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes and groaned. "That's not proof! People make bogus footprints out of cardboard and styrofoam and _rope_ , Elena. For attention. And maybe, if they're smart, money."

"I'm sure if you wanted to go down into the woods and check it out for yourself, you could."

Damon was sure he _could_ go and check it out for himself if he wanted to, but probably not without draining those phony idiots dry out of pure irritation. His father would've called them charlatans.

"It's enough proof for me," Stefan said lightly.

"Of _course_ it is." He gave him a withering look, but Stefan just smiled sheepishly.

"I think it's real," Elena declared.

"No, it's not."

"Is too."

"Is _not_."

"But there's proof!"

"They're props! It's fake!"

"It doesn't look fake!

"That's why they call it a hoax, sweetheart. Because it's a _trick._ " Damon flung his hand incredulously toward the flatscreen. He swiped a hand over his hair and shook his head. "You know what, so be it. Believe what you want."

"You're just giving up?" Elena hedged carefully.

"Of course not. Because, deep down, you know I'm right either way." Damon smiled pleasantly and stood up, announcing, "Goodnight, all. I'm off to hang like a bat from the rafters."

"Goodnight, Damon," Alaric offered genially. "Thanks for the drink."

"Night, Brother."

He nodded to them both and leaned over the back of the couch toward Elena, as if an afterthought had struck him. " _You_...are welcome to join me."

"In your dreams."

"Every night," Damon assured, smiling tightly. He dropped a kiss on her hair and vanished.

Stefan stood, also. "I think I'm going to head to bed, too. Are you gonna crash here, Elena, or go back home?"

"I think I'm going to stay up and talk to Ric a little longer, if that's okay?"

"Of course," he smiled. He squeezed her shoulder and left the room, but he didn't use his supernatural speed like Damon did.

Elena sipped on her drink slowly and waited until she heard his door close upstairs.

"Is there something you wanted to talk about, Elena?" Alaric asked curiously.

She pressed her finger to her lips.

Alaric raised his eyebrows and sat forward, whispering, "What is it? You can trust me."

"I know," Elena smiled. "Listen, Ric, I have got the _greatest_ idea, but I'm gonna need your help."

* * *

Unlike Stefan and Caroline both, he couldn't bring himself to change his hunting habits (i.e. lower his high standards) to squirrels and chipmunks and _bunnies._

To be honest, it just didn't fit his style. Even if he was trying to cut down on humans, there was no thrill in hunting rodents.

Foxes were alright, but Damon preferred deer or elk, and maybe, if he was lucky, a black bear. Unfortunately, it was late autumn-nearly Halloween-so the bears would be preparing for hibernation. And he really didn't want to go poking around in some cave for lunch when, instead, he could swing by the Grille and grab a double-cheeseburger, and an O-Neg smoothie at home for dessert.

But he wanted something fresh today, so deer it would have to be.

Whatever.

Damon paused when he heard a crunch to his left. Not making any sudden movements, he lowered himself slowly behind a stand of trees, balancing expertly on the balls of his feet. He let the vampire instincts take over and scanned his surroundings.

Dead leaves landing lightly on the ground...the waterfall, not too far away, but few miles still...a customarily snappy fall breeze...grey squirrels building their nests before Stefan made them into his lunch…

Nothing out of the ordinary.

Damon relaxed a fraction.

 _Crunch._

 _That was louder this time,_ he mused, and stepped out from behind the little group of trees. _It was closer._

 _Crunch._

His head whipped around to check behind him. And to his right. And then, directly in front of him.

The noises sounded like they were advancing in a counterclockwise movement. Like he was being surrounded. Stalked. Herded.

And, boy, as the apex predator of all the species on Earth, he didn't like that _at all._

He wouldn't ever admit it to anybody else, but he was starting to get anxious. Because he couldn't see _anything._

Until the rock came hurtling for his face.

Alarmed, he jerked his body away fast enough to avoid it impacting with his chest.

"What the hell?" Damon bent and picked it up. It was a rough piece of granite stone about the size of a baseball, and was hurled with just about the same accuracy. Annoyed, he finally snapped. "Ric! Elena! You almost _hit_ me. Would you quit it, already?"

Of course, he had overheard their plan to dress up as Bigfoot and scare him after he had left the room the other night. He had to give them points for effort, but honestly, this was getting almost stupidly elaborate. For nothing, even, if they weren't going to let him see the costume.

"Come on," he prompted, tossing the rock up into the air and catching it. "Come out of the trees and let me see your get-up. It's probably one of those gorilla suits from the Party City in Richmond, isn't it? With the black faux fur that falls out when you touch it?"

He tossed the rock a few more times, waiting.

But nobody answered, and everything was quiet again.

Damon scowled. "Guys, seriously, you're pissing me off. You'd better watch it or you're gonna be my next snack, I promise you."

He tossed the rock back on the ground, but the movement knocked his leather wallet out of his pocket.

Grimacing, he bent down to pick it up, and immediately froze. His wallet had just so happened to fall into a strangely-shaped impression in the dirt.

"Well, hello. What's this?" Damon muttered, caustically frowning down at the ground.

 _Oh._

Unbelieveable.

It was a footprint. And it looked _very_ fresh.

"Huh," Damon hummed.

He had to admit, he was sort of impressed. They had really pulled out all the stops with this prank. Maybe Ric had called in a favor from his friends at Duke to help out with faking the print. Now, it _was_ kind of weird that the print was located in the same area as he was hunting in that particular day-he liked to rotate his spots for variety and posterity-but perhaps Stefan had mentioned where he would be today and they had driven out here earlier and stamped them everywhere.

But that just seemed so... _tedious_.

He shook his head. The entire thing was probably a coincidence and he was just freaking himself out.

Dusting off his jeans, he stood up, turned around, and ran straight into a wall of fur.

"Jeez!" He backed away instantly, putting about fifteen feet of distance between them, and choked on a stunned laugh. "Wow!"

Damon wasn't often floored, but this costume of theirs was of grade-A quality. It wasn't a gorilla suit-it was _better._ The fur was brown and mottled darker in some spots; leaves were tangled in the fur on its legs. The mask and gloves were incredibly detailed and life-like, and man, it was even kind of _tall._ All the features seemed anatomically correct-it was what anybody would expect a Sasquatch to look like.

He laughed out-loud, but they didn't move.

"Guess you didn't wanna be my next meal after all, huh, Ric?" Damon shook his head and grinned, squinting at them. "You _are_ Ric in there, right?"

They snorted, and their breath steamed in the chilly air. For a moment, they stood and just watched each other-until another gust carried a startling new scent to his nose. He inhaled sharply and his eyes narrowed. It was musty and earthy, and, well, he could even go as far to say that it was wild.

Damon smiled. "You even _smell_ bad. Nice touch."

No answer.

He shrugged. He was fine with them not talking. It's not like he was the one looking like an idiot in the middle of the woods.

"As fun as this has been, I've got to run," he drawled, opening up his wallet. He fished out a crumpled dollar and held it up. "This...is for you."

When it became clear that they weren't going to physically accept the bill, he let it float to the forest floor instead.

"Fine, be that way," Damon said breezily. "Give Elena my regards from whatever bush she's hiding behind."

* * *

"Are you going to Caroline's Halloween party tonight?"

Damon looked up from his book. "Are you?"

"I dunno." Elena set her journal aside and crossed her sweatered arms across her chest. "I don't know what I'd dress up as. Maybe 'Static Cling' or something."

He closed the book around his fingers to keep his place. "You could be a vampire. I'd be honored to change you."

"No, thanks," she mumbled, and frowned at him. A thoughtful expression crossed her face. "You could always go as a werewolf."

"I think Tyler's already got that one covered." He sat back again. "Besides, they _stink._ I'd never be able to replicate the smell properly."

"But Tyler doesn't stink," Elena defended.

"He does, trust me. You just can't smell it." Damon stared warily from the opposite end of the sofa. "Anyways, you shouldn't be talking, because you smelled pretty funky the other day."

Elena was startled. "Excuse me?"

Damon took note of her surprise but shrugged anyway. "Of course, it could've been Ric in that suit, I couldn't really tell-"

"What are you talking about? What suit?"

"The sasquatch suit," he said obviously. "In the woods. On Tuesday."

"I really don't know what you're talking about-"

"Of _course_ you do. Just let it go already!" Damon exclaimed, exasperated over her denial. He'd been dying to interrogate her for days, but her reaction was aggravating him. "I admit it, you _got_ me, I was freaked out when you threw the rock-"

" _What_ rock?"

"-but I have to give you credit for the costume. It was spectacular." He gave her a small, appreciative smile and stood up, focusing only momentarily on the front door opening. "Hello, Stefan."

"Hi," Stefan greeted and walked into the living room. There was a costume bag draped on his arm. He glanced uncertainly between the two. "What's wrong? What are we talking about?"

"We're talking about how _pointless_ it is for _Elena_ to keep denying hers and Ric's Bigfoot prank."

"I'm afraid I don't have any idea what you're talking about…" Stefan shrugged awkwardly.

"Well, that makes two of us, Stefan, because I know that at least _I_ wasn't in the woods the other day!" Elena stood up, too. "I _promise._ "

Her sincerity gave him pause, but only for a second. "I don't believe you."

"Why not?" Elena demanded.

"Because!"

"That's not an answer!"

"Yes, it is!"

"Why are you being so difficult?"

"I could ask you the same question, actually."

"I'm not being difficult, I'm just confused-"

"Elena?"

She whirled away from Damon, and schooled her annoyance. "Yes, Stefan?"

He held out their landline telephone to her. "It's Alaric. He needs to talk to you about something."

The phone must have been ringing while they were arguing. She calmed slightly. "Okay."

Stefan handed her the phone.

"Hi, Ric. How'd you know I was over here?" Elena sat down lightly on the edge of the coffee table.

"That's _antique_ ," Damon hissed at her while she exchanged pleasantries. She stuck out her tongue.

"Having a good laugh at my expense, Saltzman?" He called snidely, but Elena shushed him with a wave of her hand.

He pursed his lips and paced near the hearth.

"Oh. I see."

Damon turned around at her tone. It was...off. She sounded...not exactly disappointed, but bewildered. He dropped the argument for a second, murmuring, "is everything okay?"

Elena shook her head noncommittally at him and turned her attention back to the conversation.

He looked over at Stefan and raised his eyebrows, but he only held his hands up in the air in the universal gesture of obliviousness; he clearly didn't know anything useful.

"Alright-I'll see you at school, then, Ric. Bye."

Elena ended the call and handed the phone back to Stefan; he left to hang it up again.

"What was that about?" Damon asked casually, but her weirdly calm expression made him uneasy.

"Ric was calling-"

"Duh."

She sighed deeply and continued, "-to cancel our plans to drive to Richmond on Saturday."

"Oh? Shopping spree?"

"Kind of, but it's Ric and Jenna's anniversary and he only just remembered, so he had to cancel on me."

"Shame," he frowned. "What were you planning on buying? Something risque?"

She pushed up from the coffee table and stood. "As if. We were gonna buy the gorilla suit, while we were there."

Damon felt massively triumphant at her confession until he realized what she was implying. "You were going to go this _upcoming_ Saturday? Like, the Saturday that hasn't happened yet?"

"The very same."

"Are you _sure?"_

"Pretty sure."

He rubbed his hand against his forehead. "Yeah, but that would mean-"

"Yep." Elena beamed softly up at him, and kissed his cheek. "Happy Halloween, Damon."

Damon sighed, and squeezed his eyes shut. He knew that if he opened them he'd see her expression filled up with nothing but honesty. With honesty, came truth, and therefore, facing it-but right now, he _could not deal_ with knowing that he threw a dollar at a real sasquatch.

Not yet.

"Happy Halloween, Elena."

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